The Mantle's Approach
by stormdragon981
Summary: On the hunt for the Precursors, the UGDC enters the Andromeda galaxy. When a supercarrier comes in contact with the Galactic Republic, the far far away galaxy will never be the same. Somewhat AU. OCs


Author's note: To be clear I am once again giving Halo lots of power. However, before you pull out your guns, hear me out. To compensate for this, I have reduced the Halo fleets to only the hundred thousands while the Republic has its canon 1 million ships. It was also stated in the Star Wars the clone wars that the CIS had 4x the # of ships the Republic had so there is that. Happy now. In a way its like Japan vs America WW2; Japan couldn't match the shipbuilding of the US, so they made ships that can take on multiple ships like the Yamamoto. Another note- their will be elements from other areas of fiction but not enough to be considered a multi crossover. Just another warning. Also constructive criticism and new ideas are welcome, flames are not. Takes place before the Phantom Menace.

First Blood  
(Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahaaaaaaaaaaa!)  
(I should see a psychiatrist )

2570- 47 years since the end Great War. Though the major conflict has ended, unfortunately that did not means peace would ensue. As was the nature of not just humanity, but the whole milky way galaxy. The three species at first remained independent for the most part carrying on with their lives. The Kig-yar were busy trading and pirating and at a slow pace, building a professional military and central government, the Humans and Sangheili were rebuilding their worlds and colonies, the Jiralhanae were in a civil war while Lydus and his followers tried to establish order, and the Unggoy, Mgalekgol and Yanme'e just kept to themselves for the most part. Relations between the species were lukewarm at best. While each species held some resentment towards each other, they all collectively believed that it was best not to cause any war.

2582- The relative peace that was present was shattered in this year. The prophets that had survived had returned with an army Jiralhanae cloned from a Forerunner artifact, and a fleet of ships built by the Huragok that they had taken with them. They united with the storm covenant and began a massive assault akin to the Tet offensive on the rest of the species seeing them as heretics. To add to this, the conduit artifact that the UNSC has been trying to capture decided that this was the perfect opportunity to start spawning Prometheans all over the place. As if it couldn't get any worse the flood had managed to form a new grave mind that used all the remaining flood to launch an all out assault on the species.

2583- Faced with a galaxy wide extinction event, all of the galactic species quickly formed a massive joint military known as United Galactic Defense Conglomerate (UGDC). Reluctantly ONI shared the data it had gained from the forerunner installations that were found with the Janus key with the other species in order to manufacture new weapons to combat this threat. Using the data new firearms that used either hard light, energized matter similar to pulsars, or using particle beams combined with superheated plasma crushed into high density using the gravity technology used by Jiralhanae. The infantry also underwent upgrades. All troops were given augmentations equivalent to Spartan IIIs along with modifications to the nervous system to make them immune to the flood. Along with this all troops were given nanite augmentations that not only enhanced their reflexes, senses, instincts, muscle density, neural activity, and bone structure, they also granted them the ability to regenerate quickly, even allowing them to regrow lost limbs and organs. However, if they got beheaded, they were dead. They were also granted resistance to high temperatures and electricity, essentially meaning that fire and lighting were harmless to them. However, plasma would still do damage and hard light would still disintegrate them with ease. To compliment this. They were issued new power armor that enhanced their physiology even further. It used nanotech to make itself highly durable and capable of self repair, it also had 1-3 layers of shielding along with an emergency hard light shield. An automated system efficiently managed the shield and only deployed it when the incoming threat could bypass the shield(s) and armor as hard light drains lots of power. The armor also allowed them to pull of insane parkour maneuvers (Titanfall) and survive reentry into atmosphere. Vehicles generally used anti gravity for movement and energy projectors with the ability to arc as armament. The united fleet also went under a massive upgrade. Thanks to the forerunner shipyards and captured sentinel factories, they could build ships as big or even bigger than the covenant vessels, the largest type of ships at the time. The design looked like a strange cross between prehistoric human ships, forerunner ships and UNSC ships. The energy projectors were standard issue on ships as their secondary weapon. Particle beams were utilized as anti air and point defense. To replace the old MAC cannons, a new weapon was made. An anti proton cannon. Anti-protons were condensed to the density of a white dwarf star and then fired at speeds close to speed of light. While twice as fast reloading speed as the MAC, it was still slow firing compared to other weapons. Sentinels of every design were also mass produced to aid in ground and ship combat. And finally the SPARTANS! With the new augmentations, SPARTANS could be made from other species. However, the only species that were inducted so far were Humans, Sangheili, Jiralhanae, and Skirmishers as their physiology was easily able to adapt to the augmentations. The armor combines designs from both forerunner class 18 armor and the prehistoric human armor. (combine this image  . .html?t=1280972705 with this image  . /_ ,)

2648- With their new weapons and larger numbers, the UGDC pushed back and wiped out the flood, covenant remnant and the invading Prometheans. However, the slip space artifact escaped again, and it was still rumored that the flood and prophets were still alive. It came at a great cost, most of the fleet and colonies were destroyed. The war somehow showed even greater horrors than the Great War.

2650- The master chief, who was on a solitary journey, had stumbled across a planet that looked like a shield world, but did not share the design of the of the forerunners. Once in the core of the shield world, he stumbled across a grave mind. However, this grave mind was different. It looked more highly evolved and had a digital/synthetic appearance. It revealed itself to be the last true Precursor, and that this installation was out of the range of the Halo array. This particular Precursor chose this form to be reincarnated into, as he managed to absorb the original strain of the flood powder before it became corrupted, allowing him to avoid the effects of the flood. He began to explain the history of the galaxy, how the Precursors seeded galaxies with life, the mantle, their war with the Forerunners and how humanity was meant to be their successors. It expressed regret about what the Precursors planned to do to them with the flood. Before it died, the Precursor ordered John and the rest of the galaxies species to seek out the other galaxies and restore the honor of the Precursors and hopefully reach transcendence and uphold the true mantle, a destiny that was forcefully taken from them twice.

2651- Despite their best efforts, ONI couldn't stop the information from leaking to the public. Surprisingly, the galactic public took the information very well, agreeing with the Precursor that they should wait until they are ready to uphold the mantle. Soon after the galaxy began to hate the Forerunners, seeing that their rebellion set the chain of events that had humanity's destiny taken, the release of the flood and plunging the galaxy into endless warfare. Also to the surprise and shock of the Galactic community a ship full of san'shyuum appeared near one of the colonies called eden prime. The local defense fleet was about to fire on the ship until it transmitted a message saying that they were here for peaceful intentions and wanted to join the UGDC. They had apparently been exiled from the covenant in the middle of the Great War. They had not only discovered a forerunner relic that showed them that the humans were the reclaimers and inheritors of the mantle, but they discovered their Prehistoric civilization, their alliance with the Prehistoric Humans and what the Forerunners did to them. Using the forerunner artifacts and what little data they could gather from the alliance, they had managed to resurrect their old culture and had even brought back remnants of Prehistoric Humanity that they had managed to build. After hearing these claims and investigating the technology, the UGDC unanimously agreed to incorporate them into the alliance. With the new colonies given to them and medical technology provided to them, the san'shyuum were able to increase their population to the billions. They had also contributed to the alliance their scientific prowess, as this was honed from years of reverse engineering forerunner technology. Likewise the larger community was able to easily integrate them into the UGDC, as they shared their pain of what the forerunners did.

2655- The Precursor's wish was just another add on to the growing number of problems facing the UGDC. The second great war, which was later known as the Reclamation War, had left a serious toll on the UGDC. Most of the colonies were glassed and would take more than a decade to re terraform. The military was severely gutted, because despite the highly advanced army, they were severely outnumber by the Flood, Storm Covenant and promethean forces. The enemies also seemed to be smarter than anticipated. The flood had a gravemind, which was quickly eradicated, but the Promethean and storm forces appeared to be lead by the didact, however he never revealed himself in combat. With the army gutted, the council needed a cheap, potent, mobile and quick military force that could defend territories and travel to other galaxies while also have enough intelligence capabilities to successfully respond to threats. The answer came in the form of the United Expeditionary Ranger Corp. A combination of local planetary militias, defected insurrectionists, private military companies, private security companies, mercenaries, former pirates, weapon manufacturers, mining companies and war veterans in fighting condition lead by a UGDC created intelligence agency, the UERC was the perfect answer to this problem. Using funding from the companies within the UREC and donations from the public they built ships which combined designs from covenant and unsc ships giving the appearance shark like prowler ships. They were retrofitted with forerunner drives found on onyx, singularity reactor cores, advanced post Great War MACs that fired a beam of a molten tungsten-depleted uranium-high carbon steel alloy at 85% the speed of light in 7 round burst with a two minute recharge. The fleets armor is enhanced with a metal compound made with the element vibranium (which the UERC discovered in one of their asteroid mining facilities) and a compound called adamantium which they created. While not as strong as the new armor being made for the military, it was durable enough for their purposes. The fleet is deployed in a total of 20 battle groups each made of 5000 ships each.

2663- Originally many people had looked down on the UERC, seeing them as primitive, undisciplined, untrained, and inferior to the military. This all changed during the 10 year long Pacification War. A jiralhanae terrorist group brought together some Kig-yar pirates, rouge yanme'e and human mercs to use a forerunner ship factory to wage an anarcho uprising against the UGDC. To the surprise of the Galaxy, the UERC was able to successfully put down the revolt earning them the respect of the Galaxy, along with a boost in membership.

2664- After showing their potence, ONI sends them on a special task to investigate the nearby Andromeda galaxy. However, a highly classified part of the mission was to test out the composer, which ONI had rebuilt and hoped to use it to produce the UGDC's own promethean army. A small group of 72 UERC Supercarriers is deployed to Andromeda. While in slipspace, the ships were forced to exit as there were problems with the slipspace drive. When they exited, they had stumbled across a fleet of organic ships. Communications between the two fleets revealed that they were a species known as the Vong. They had lost their homeworld and hoped to find a new world in the Andromeda to settle. The UERC admiral offered the Vong sanctuary in the Milky Way. However, this had split the vong species into two sides. On one side there the Vong who wanted to follow the UERC's offer. The other side saw their use of technology as horrendous and a betrayal of their gods and ideals. This lead the larger conservative side to attack the the minority and the UERC fleet. Outnumbered and with little options, the admiral was forced to fire the composer on the majority of the Vong. Eventually, through tough negotiations, the Vong were given some solar systems to colonize. The Vong decided to slowly open up to the rest of the galaxy, as they still would have to get used to the use of technology by the other species.

Our story begins on the _Solari Inquisition,_ a 32 km long UERC supercarrier that had just returned with a powerful forerunner shard that had immense power, although its capabilities are unknown….

"To be honest, when I volunteered to go on this mission, I expected to be amongst veterans and state of the art equipment, not new recruits and old weaponry," said lieutenant colonel scout spartan VI Tiberius Mardini as he was tinkering with a binary rifle trying to deactivate the laser sight, and failing.

On the other side of the armory sat Dyrsaeus, a Jiralhanae Stalker, who was upgrading a gravity hammer that he took from the weapon racks with hard light blades.

"I am surprised that we had even had this mission, I assumed the _forerunners_ would not have have left anything behind from their expedition to exterminate the precursors," said Dyrsaeus, sneering the word forerunner.

At that moment, a sangheili ranger spartan entered the armory. "Speaking of the artifact, there is something eerie about it," said Graso 'Kasov.

Dyrsaeus and Tiberius looked at Graso quizzically, "What do you mean," questioned Tiberius.

"I have been looking through the mission archives and I came across one of our old missions, where we had to find the conduit. I had done some scans on the shard, they are giving off similar readings," replied Graso.

Both of his friends paled after hearing that paled slightly. They knew all too well about the conduit. They had been deployed on a mission to locate the conduit and capture or destroy it. To reach the conduit, they had decided to use one of its own portals to reach the artifact. When they came on to other side, they were faced with an army of prometheans. However, they were in varying insectoid forms and seemed to be upgraded, being faster stronger, more strategic and have stronger armor. The weirdest part of the mission came with Tiberius. As they had traveled through slipspace, Tiberius came in contact with a promethean that had been dissolved as it was travelling from the other side of the porta;. When they exited, his armor was covered in strange tattoo marks (graffiti armor dead space marks). Soon his eyes and marks had started glowing a blue color. He immediately charged at the army, with hard light swords projecting from his palms, and mercilessly slaughtered them. It was latter discovered that his mind was in a way destroyed. When under intense situations like combat, he would enter this animal like state, and attack any target with unrestrained fury, whether friend or foe. It was after that mission that he always kept himself far from combat in order to avoid killing his friends and comrades.

Suddenly the ship trembled slightly. "Attention, this is shipmaster Sisebis, we are currently facing drive core problems and have exited slipspace to make repairs," said a voice over the intercom.

"Well, I am headed to the engines to the drive core to see what is going on, I will see you later," called Tiberius as he exited the armory.

Twenty minutes after Tiberius left and after Dyrsaeus left to the cafeteria, Graso began to notice something odd. There was complete silence in this area of the ship. Where was everyone? Graso began walking down the hallways checking every room for his fellow crewmembers. The block was devoid of life. No humans trash talking, no jiralhanae getting into fights, no sangheili maintenancing their weapons, no Kig-yar gambling, no Yanme'e or Huragok flying around, no Unggoy drinking narcotics, san'shyuum playing chess, or Mgalekgolo meditating. Suddenly he heard a scream followed by rifle fire around a corner. When he turned he saw a scorpion like promethean disintegrating a human. Quickly he pulled out his light rifle and head shot the scorpion just as it opened its helmet. Suddenly the whole battlenet exploded to life, then the shipmaster's voice rang out "Slipspace portals have been opened all over the ship letting in promethean forces all over the ship, fight my brothers and wipe this scourge from the universe!" Right after he finished a primal roar resounded throughout the battlenet and the ship.

"Oh great, Tiberius has entered his primal rage state, maybe being disintegrated isn't so bad," thought Graso.

Coruscant

Meanwhile in the Galactic Senate, an emergency meeting was being held by the Republic Senate.

"Members of the Galactic Senate, I thank you for coming to this meeting on short notice. I will cut straight to the point. We have received a distress call from the outer rim. The communications do not match our own, and the organization does not show up in our databases so it is assumed that this is a first contact scenario, this was the message that was played," said Finis Valorum as he began to play the recording.

(UERC armor is various combinations of deadspace armor  .  and titanfall pilot armor  -Ic5zqluIxUQ/VJjE8x-x9gI/AAAAAAAAASo/7qWquS_ySMQ/w980-h335/Pilotsbanner_  )

When the hologram appeared, there were three species. A simian creature that looked similar to a wookie, except bigger and stronger, that was wielding some form of a grenade launcher. The second creature had avian features and was using a what appeared to be a sniper rifle. The final being was surprisingly human, however the weapons and armor it had were unknown to the people of the senate. The recording played.

 _Human: This is UERC Supercarrier Solari Inquisition, we are being overrun by promethean forces requesting immediate assistance. Avian creature: How are we getting overrun, this ships the size of a city. Avian creature gets shot and disintegrates. Simian creature fires grenade launcher in the direction of the shot, then gets stabbed by a sword. The human fires at the sword owner. Human:Fall back, I repeat fall bac-aaaaaaahhhh. The human gets shot in the chest and disintegrates from there still in screaming until he disappears. Then a large robot with an oversized back appears with a blade on one arm and some strange blaster on the other arm. To opens its faceplate to reveal a human skull and lets out a terrifying roar. End recording._

Soon, Finis Valorum said what was on everyone's mind: "Contact the Jedi temple immediately!"


End file.
